WMV Music Web Log

Went to hear Jon Morris and Cameron McPhee in "Eigenvalues" last night at the Lyceum. They were great! They created surprisingly clearcut music from words, clarinet, and digital looping. A Bach cello suite was transformed elegantly into nonsense syllables, and they even did some nicely complex rhythms in nonsense Hawaiian.

The real surprise was "Old Songs". Mandolin, guitar, vocals, and old timey fiddle, with lyrics from ancient Greek poetry. When they first started I almost burst out laughing because they sounded so amateur - they couldn't find the key, or each other - but halfway into the first song they began to sound like the Incredible String Band. Simple, genuine, vulnerable, and surprisingly moving. Made me think - what does it really take to make music? The fiddler is the real thing - she played notes that no classically trained violinist would dare. They were Mark Jickling, Chris Mason, Liz Downing, and Rebby Sharp, I think, all apparently with punk rock credentials.

Dreamt last night that the "engine" indicator light went on in my van. I considered trying to go on, but decided to pull over. Someone advised that this could be a serious problem. I woke up thinking: WMV is doing well, but I personally am very tired - it was a hard summer, and there have been unexpected difficulties this fall. The music is business is tough any way you look at it.

Seems like I'm just coming up for air, and I don't even know from under what. Oh, yes. We suddenly had to move the DC music series to the Sitar Center, after the Atlas opened up their new hall. It seems that the old Atlas "Theatre II" is now a rehearsal space, and all they could offer us was the lobby. The grant proposals are coming back rejected one by one. And I busted the budget on the last program. It wasn't worth it, and I am re-thinking some things.

On the positive side, the ACF Fireworks Ensemble concert at Sitar was spectacular - Mar and I loved every minute of it. Clearly, these young musicians are having a great time, if not making much money. I'm afraid I am getting very tired of the grimness that passes for "professionalism" around here. Ah, New York! And we got to hear/see Maurice Saylor's Snark Ensemble repeat their incredible sound track to the 1928 Charlie Bowers silent film "There It Is!"

Speaking of NY, Charley Gerard's new CD "A Reed Breaks in Dumbo", is wonderful. The sound of his saxophone quartet is juicy. The emotional range of the music is wide, some of it teary/moving and some red-hot. I listened to it going back and forth on Rockville Pike.

Here is a clip from yesterday's practice session on Mozart K.333, while the painters were scraping the walls outside:
moz333_2.mp3

Although it sounds like nothing special, I was noticing the kind of bad assumptions from my training that have to be undone to get a simple sounding rendition; like, emphasize the strong beats and reduce the weak beats (no), decrescendo on appoggiaturas (no), keep a metronomic beat (no), play delicately (no), etc. Mozart was a jazzer.

One relies on interaction with other musicians for inspiration in ensemble performance. But in solo performance, it is only the audience that can provide the external energy. All alone, one quickly becomes stale. Music that was so interesting yesterday is not so much today, especially once the musical or performance problems have been resolved. The closer to performance ready, the less inner necessity to sit down and play the same music, alone, once again. Better schedule a concert, just to share what has been gained in practise, and to absorb what new ears and hearts reflect.

On to the next thing! In this case, Maurice Saylor's exciting arrangements of "V+W" songs by Jaroslav Jezek from the Prague Liberated Theater of the 1930's. I'm giving him voice, trumpet, alto sax, baritone sax, clarinet, trombone, tuba, violin, drums, and piano - everything he asked for except the tenor banjo, which causes him some regret. He sent me the first one as a Scorch file, which means you can see the score and play a synthesized version at the same time. I wonder if I can post a Scorch file on the blog?

Something to ask David.

In the mean time, here is a short clip from an original 1930's V+W song, "Clothes Make the Man": v+w_clothes.mp3

The Brahms clarinet quintet Op. 115, one of those life-saving pieces of music. I must know every emotional nuance of this work, but never heard it live until last night, and in my own house. I cleared the couch and table out of the living room, so the musicians could fit, and sat on the floor with the DAT recorder. It was almost unbearably beautiful. Here is a short audio clip from this, the first rehearsal:

br114.1b.mp3

The 2006-07 season is just about to plunge into full gear. It feels like the whole city is about to wake up and be overcrowded, overbusy, stressed out, on the make, as usual. At least people will be more likely to answer my phone calls - they don't have the excuse of being camping or at the beach.

This season looks different in a couple of ways: one, I have not returned the pile of solo paste-ups to the plastic file drawers where they live between reception gigs. In fact, I have ordered them into neat folders, "Chopin Nocturnes", "Washington Composers", "Brahms Intermezzi, etc", "Czech Music". I seem to have prepared a prototype basic solo program ready to go - where? And there are several others in preparation. My goodness, I am even considering some solo Dvorak for the next Czech Embassy concert. What has gotten into me?

Also, word is out that I am looking for ensemble music that does not have me in it - I need to do some other stuff, and it's about time to loosen my iron grip after more than 10 years of playing in every piece on every concert. There are great musicians all around me who can be trusted to turn out superb performances. Jodi Beder has a solo cello piece with computer accompaniment, Ben has some stuff, jazz and classic, and Karyn, Gary, and Elizabeth want to produce an evening of opera.

I have a very interesting pile of solo piano music by local composers: Blair Goins, Larry Moss, Lawrence Heinen, Gregg Martin, Ulf Grahn, "Jelly Roll" Morton, Eubie Blake, Andrew Stiller, and Janet Peachey; and Charley Gerard just sent a new piece that combines Ellington's In a Sentimental Mood with Bach's Goldberg Variations. He calls it "Goldberg's in a Sentimental Mood", or the "Ellingberg Variations".

This season I think I want to dip further into foreign genres, with the help of talented and capable composers, arrangers, jazz, folk, latin, and other musicians that populate this town.

Marilyn and I are discussing what cool things we can plan for the studio this year. One that Ben suggested is Claude Bolling's Suite for Flute, using C clarinet instead of flute, with piano, drums and bass. And it is time to research the poetry scene again. We have a couple of poets in mind, and will start going to some readings.